Free Operation Bamboozle by Derek Robinson

Audrey Hepburn. They ain’t so sure about you. You win the ugly prize down catfish alley.”
    He looked at the painting. “You know, I sort of like the idea of a dog on the bank.”
    â€œMrs. Chandler won’t come back,” Julie said. Defeat had flattened her voice. “She’ll tell her friends we’re New York snobs.”
    â€œWell, she got a point.” Princess said. “I favor garlic, anchovies and a hot chili with this beauty. That how you cook it in New York?”
    â€œWe’re bust,” Julie said. “Finished.”
    â€œI don’t think New York ever saw a catfish,” Luis said. “Immigration hasn’t got a catfish quota.” He had meant to tell them about saving Freddy Garcia from the wolves, but now wasn’t the right time. “Chin up, old girl,” he said, and wished he hadn’t. This wasn’t World War Two. This was serious. This was Art. Unless it was crap. He gave up.
4
    When he was eight, and visiting his uncle’s farm, Tony Feet got too interested in the action and the rear wheel of a tractor ran over his feet. Luckily his boots were new, the ground was soft, and the broken bones healed, but ever afterward he walked delicately, as if he didn’t completely trust the ground beneath him. When he joined the Organization he was called Tony Feet, not in mockery, but because a lot of Tonys worked there.
    He came down the steps from the airliner and Eugene Lutz met him. They talked in the car. “So we buried the wrong body,” Feet said. “I used to wonder who put Blanco in the lake. Problem was, he blew the whistle on so many of our people, itcould have been any one of them. Or anyone’s brother-in-law. Some cop, even. Plenty on the payroll.”
    â€œI know. I paid them.”
    â€œYou get a good look at him?”
    Lutz nodded. “I could tell straight off. I called his name and he jumped three point seven feet off the ground and pissed himself a pint and a quarter.” Feet laughed. “Two percent margin of error,” Lutz said. “Either way.”
    â€œGet a load of this sunshine. Why can’t Chicago be in Texas, Gene?”
    â€œIt’s a penance,” Lutz said. “For inventing chewing gum.”
    A man called Fitzroy was waiting in the lobby of Lutz’s apartment block. Fiftyish, thin, anonymous except for his eyes. He had tailor’s eyes: they felt your wallet while they measured your inside leg. “Mr. Giancana mentioned a photograph,” he said. Tony Feet gave him a dozen prints. “He’s put on fifty pounds,” Lutz said. “Lost a lot of hair, too.”
    â€œI’ve got my people out looking,” Fitzroy said. “If he’s in El Paso, we’ll find him.”
    â€œIf he’s in El Paso
he
might want to find
you,”
Feet said to Lutz. “You scared him. Go pack a bag. You and me, we’ll stay at a hotel. What’s the best?”
    â€œThe Bristol,” Fitzroy said. “My cousin’s the manager. It will be an honor. No charge.”
    â€œSee?” Lutz said. “You should live here, Tony. People are real friendly.”
    â€œOne of your guys goes in the Lutz apartment,” Feet told Fitzroy. “In case Blanco calls.”

    Fate had been a big disappointment to Frankie Blanco. He’d given it his best shot, and what had it come up with? First off, nothing much. And now, too much. Fuck fate. You’re fired.
    That was one good decision, and it made him feel better, so he had another idea: go hide in Mexico. For what? Forever? The idea began to hurt his brain. Lousy idea.
Stick to what you’re good at, Frankie,
his mother had always said. He was good at whacking people and at pumping gas. He had the Texaco job, no strain on the brain, so long as you didn’t smoke near the pumps. He went back to work.
    Between cars, he wondered how come Eugene Lutz was in El Paso. Someone in Chicago